The Story of the Life of MacKay of UgandaChapter XV -
MacKay as Undertaker

“And last, as
sunk the setting sun,
And Evening, with her shadows dun,
The gorgeous pageant passed,
‘Twas then of life a mimic show,
Of human grandeur here below,
Which thus beneath the fatal blow
Of Death must fall at last.”

W. ALLSTON.

COLONEL GRANT,
in alluding to the surprising confidence in which the Baganda held Mackay.
refers to the funeral arrangements of Namasole, the Queen Dowager of the
country, with which he was entrusted, and the extraordinary fame he won
thereby. [See Blackwood’s Magazine, May 1890.] In writing his
father, 27th March, 1882, Mackay says: “The King’s mother has just passed
away, and not only she, but an old man, an elder brother of the king, has
died to-day also. The drums are now being beaten at the palace, to frighten
away the King of Terrors, and escort the departed spirits into the unseen
world. The ghosts of kings and great men alone are here thought to live
after death. They are said to enter certain sorcerers and sorceresses, who
henceforth become privileged persons. This belief is something like the
Hindu dogma of transmigration of souls. The old queen died of typhoid fever,
as Pete Lourdel, who saw her, informs us. He was asked by Mtesa to give her
medicine, but she would not take the Muzungu’s (white man’s) medicine, nor
even allow anyone near her wearing calico or anything foreign. So her
diviners brought their charms, and the native druggers drenched her with
their physic. She collapsed next day and died.”

Continuing his
letter on the 7th May, he says: ‘Since I penned the above all hope of
sending off letters was knocked on the head. The Royal mourning lasted a
month, during which time no work was allowed to be done in the land. No boat
could start, nor anyone carry a load, until the queen was buried. But while
all had respite from work I was toiling hard night and day, for thirty days,
for all were waiting for me. The morning after Namasole died, Mr. O'Flaherty
and I went to court to pay our respects to the king. All the chiefs were
clad in rags, and crying, or rather roaring, with their hands clasped
above their heads. Mtesa determined to make a funeral to surpass in
splendour any burial that had ever taken place in the country. Such is the
desire of every king to outstrip his predecessors. Fifty thousand bark
cloths were ordered to be levied in the .land, besides some thousands of
yards of English calico. Mtesa asked me ‘how we buried royalty in Europe?’ I
replied that we made three coffins, the inner of wood, the next of lead, and
the outer of wood covered with cloth. I knew the custom of the Baganda in
burying their kings, viz., to wrap the body - after mummifying it - in
several thousand bark cloths, and bury the great pile in a huge grave,
building a house over all and appointing certain witches to guard the grave
for generations.

“‘Would you be
able to make the three coffins?’ Mtesa asked me. I replied, ‘Yes, if you
find the material.’ He said he had no lead, but he had a lot of copper trays
and drums which he would supply, if I could manufacture a coffin out of
them.”

“Frequently we
had been twitted by the king and court for failing to work for him;
accordingly 1 agreed to be undertaker, thinking it a small affair. But then
the dimensions! Everything was to be made as large as possible!!!
Immediately all the copper in the king’s stores was turned out, and sent
down to our Mission. Fine large bronze trays of Egyptian workmanship
(presents probably from General Gordon), copper drums, copper cans, and
copper pots and plates - all were produced, and out of the materials I was
to make a coffin for the queen. All the artificers were ordered to my
assistance.” The rest of the description is chiefly taken from his journal:-

“Next morning
I went off to Rusaka, some three miles distant, to measure the body. Much
objection was made by the royal ladies there at my going in to measure the
corpse. But my friend Kyambalango was there, as master of ceremonies, and he
explained that I was commissioned by the king. But I was somewhat taken
aback on being told by some of the other chiefs that I should have measured
not the corpse, but the dimensions of the grave, and make the coffins to fit
the latter! I told them that there was not copper enough in the land to make
a box larger than necessary; that if there was, I would willingly make a
coffin as large as a mountain, but as it was, I could make the inner coffins
to suit the body, and the outer one as large as a house if they liked.”

"Meantime
Gabunga, the ‘Grand Admiral’ and lord of the lake, had gone to the forest
for wood. I got all the native smiths together, and converting the building,
which we were fitting up for a school, into a smithy, all hands were set to
work beating out the copper into flat plates. Tools, of course, we had to
supply for punching, shearing, and riveting, but before a couple of days
were over, the native smiths thought good to steal a drill. How many copper
nails they stole no-one knows, only these disappeared far faster than the
work required.”

“Gabunga first
brought broad planks, adzed by canoe builders, but so irregular and crooked
that they were fit for little or nothing. A huge tree had been chopped down
to make two boards! I asked him to fetch some solid logs. These he declared
impossible to transport; however, he tried, and next evening he returned
with some two hundred men dragging a large slice of a tree, by the natural
creepers they had tied round it. I laughed at the shapeless thing, and
declared I could carry it alone! At once I took the body of the cart off its
wheels, and lashed the log under the axle with leather ropes. Then with one
hand I pulled along the road a log which had taken a regiment to drag, to
the consternation and joy of all. They yelled and clapped their hands and
jumped about with delight at such a wonder, each one rushing up to me and
taking me by the hand, in ecstasy at such a prodigy. ‘Mackay is truly the
lubare’ (= the devil, but their god).”

“So they must
have the cart to fetch trees with, in spite of my protestations that they
did not know how to manage it, and would be sure to break it or come by an
accident to themselves. Before they were out of the plantation they landed
it several times in the ditch! Still they were determined, so I sent a
couple of Wangwana with them, and was agreeably surprised to find them come
back next day with a fair-sized log under the axle, and the cart actually
safe and sound. But they did not want to take the cart again.”

“In ten days’
time we had finished the two inner coffins, the first being of wood,
cushioned all inside with cotton wool, and covered all over, inside and out,
with snow-white calico secured with a thousand copper tacks. Ornamental work
I made by cutting patterns out of black and white pocket-handkerchiefs, and
tacking them on. The copper box measured seven feet long by three feet wide
and three feet high, shaped like a coffin. But the king’s copper was enough
for little more than the lid and ends, so we had to supply for the sides
four sheets of copper plate, which the king paid for at once in ivory, as we
did not think well to give these away out of the Mission stores gratis. We
gave our workmanship and skill and time gratis, besides the tools, and all
the iron nails (no small quantity). We received copper wire as an equivalent
for the copper tacks. Even the copper coffin we neatly lined all over inside
with white calico tacked on to laths which were first riveted to the copper
plate.”

“It is
needless to describe the worry and trouble we had, working late and early,
and sometimes all night. At every hour of the day pages were sent down to
inspect the progress and ask when we would be done. The native workmen,
especially the head men among them, would do almost nothing, and generally
spoiled what they did. They preferred sitting down all day smoking, and
watching how I did. I was able to get some assistance, however, from several
of the younger fellows.”

“When we had
the two boxes carried up to the Court and shown to the king, he expressed
unbounded satisfaction, and asked us what we wanted for our work. We replied
that we wanted nothing at all. But he gave us ten head of cattle on the
spot, in addition to several cows and a hundred bunches of plantains,
besides many gallons of beer, which he sent while the work was in progress.”

“But even in
the execution of a small work like this, which all allowed to be far beyond
their own powers to accomplish, there must needs be an exhibition of
jealousy and ill-feeling on the part of some - chiefs and Arabs.”

“They told the
king that we made the coffins small, much too small for Namasole, because we
wanted the timber to finish our own house with; that we had already secreted
in our house a lot of boards; that perhaps we might show good workmanship,
but we could not work fast.”

“The Arabs
also asserted that it would take us some three months to make the large
outer box. Then Namkade (one of the envoys who went to England) was called
in, and was asked how the English built? How long did it take them to build
a house? were they like us, who had been a whole year over one house, which
was not finished yet?”

“Namkade (no
friend of ours) replied that the Bazungu were very slow in building; in
fact, that they built a piece of a house, and then lived in that while they
worked at building the remainder!” [Probably the envoy had seen repairs
going on at some large mansion while the people were living in it, or
perhaps his ideas could not be separated from a Baganda hut, which can be
commenced and finished in one day, being entirely of reeds and grass, and
which, when needing repair, is simply pulled down or burnt in five minutes
and a new one knocked up in its place.]

“Mtesa alone
stood our friend. He refused to believe that we had appropriated any boards,
while he said to our accusers that what was done well could not be done in a
day. ‘Can a woman cook plantains well if you hurry her?’ asked the friendly
king.”

“We had
commenced to cut wood for the large outer box, which was to measure twelve
feet long by seven feet wide and eight feet high. I was sharpening the
pit-saws and setting them, when an order came that all the native artisans
were to go and make a box after their own fashion at or near Rusaka (where
the queen died). We knew that this order did not come from the king, but
from the katikiro and chiefs. Of course the smiths and carpenters left at
once. Mr. O'Flaherty went to court, and was told by Mtesa that we were to
make the box. Still the native artisans did not return, while a few
Mutongoles came with gangs of men, and carried off all the planks they could
from here, leaving only the huge logs which Mr. O'Flaherty had cut himself
in the forest. So we put on our own Wangwana to the saws, I having
previously marked off each log into boards. But who could use the saws? Such
work at first! Zigzags of every style; each board varying in thickness at
every inch. But we held on, and by-and-bye they got more into the way of
it.”

“We gave them
large supplies of beef and beer every day, and in a week’s time we had about
a hundred boards cut and squared to fit, and nailed together with strong
ribs like the sides of a schooner When together, it looked like a small
house rather than a coffin!”

“In another
couple of days we should have been done of the job, but suddenly our braves
decamped, all except two, leaving us in the lurch. We sent word to the
court, and had the native artisans fetched at once. These had to be
initiated into using the long saws, but they soon learned, and in a few
days’ time we had enough of boards for the lid. Then we covered the whole
outside with native bark cloth, and lined the inside with pure snow-white
calico. Each side was a piece by itself, made so for transport. A thousand
men arrived to carry the segments, and most fortunately it did not rain. We
put them together before the king, who challenged all to say if such
workmanship could be done in the country by Baganda, or if anything of the
kind had ever been seen in the land?”

“Next day we
had the king’s orders to go to the burial. He wanted us to go the same day,
but we were too tired, having for a full month been constantly at saw and
hammer from dawn to midnight, and often later.”

“The grave was
a huge pit, some twenty feet by fifteen feet at the mouth, by about thirty
feet deep. It was dug in the centre of the late queen’s sleeping-house - a
monstrous hut, some one hundred and fifty feet in diameter, as usual all
roof and no walls, and a perfect forest of poles inside, the centre ones
being good enough for frigate masts.”

“Rusaka stands
on a hill of dry sandstone, clay, and gravel. It is well the stratum is so
firm, otherwise serious accidents might have happened from the sides of the
grave slipping.”

“Nearly all
the excavated gravel had been carried away, while the monster pit was neatly
lined all round with bark cloth. Into this several thousand new bark cloths
were thrown and carefully spread on the bottom, filling up the hole a long
way. Then the segments of the huge box were lowered in with much trouble. I
descended and nailed the corners together.”

“After that I
was summoned to the ceremony of putting the corpse into the first coffin.
Thousands of women were there, yelling with all their might, and a few with
tears in their eyes. Only the ladies of royal family and the highest chiefs
were near the corpse, which by this time had been reduced to a mummy by
constantly squeezing out the fluids with rags of bark doth. It was wrapped
in a new mbugu, and laid on the ground. The chiefs half filled the nicely
padded coffin with bufta (bleached calico), then several bundles of petty
charms belonging to the queen were laid in. After that, the corpse, and then
the coffin was filled up with more bufta. Kimbugwe, Kauta, and the other
chiefs in charge, carried the coffin to the court, where the grave-house
was, when much more yelling took place. I screwed the lid down, but such was
the attachment of some of the royal ladies to the deceased that I had to get
them peremptorily ordered away, with their crying and tears and hugging of
the coffin, before I could get near to perform my duties as undertaker.”

“Then came the
copper coffin, into which the other was lowered by means of a huge sheet.
The lid of that had to be riveted down, and that process was new to the
chiefs standing by. ‘He cuts iron like thread,’ they said, as the pincers
snapped the nails. ‘Mackay is a proper smith!’ they all shouted.”

“With no
mechanical contrivances, it was astonishing how they got the copper coffin,
with its ponderous contents, lowered into the deep grave without letting it
fall end foremost into the great box below. The task was effected, however,
by means of the great multitude of men.”

“Thousands of
yards of unbleached calico (shirting) were then filled in round and over the
copper coffin, until the big box was half full. The remainder was filled up
with bark cloths, as also all the space round the outside of the box. The
lid was lowered, and I descended once more to nail it down. Several thousand
more mbugus were then laid on till within three feet of the surface, when
earth was thrown in to the level of the floor.”

“We returned
at dusk, but the burying was not completed till nearly midnight. Next
morning every man, woman, and child in the land had their heads shaved, and
put off their mourning dress of tattered mbugus and belts of plantain
leaves. The country had been waiting till we were done with our carpentry.”

“Mr.
O'Flaherty and I made an estimate of the value of cloth buried that day in
the grave of Queen Namasole, and we reckon the amount to be about fifteen
thousand pounds sterling! The Arabs made an independent calculation,
counting the calico and mbugus in equivalent of ivory, and their reckoning
agrees pretty nearly with our own. Such-like is the barbaric splendour of
the court of Uganda. Who would have thought, in the civilised world, of
burying fifteen thousand pounds' worth of cloth in the grave of even a
queen?”

“Being so
inaccessible, one would not have believed that there was so much cloth in
the country, ten or twelve yards of the dressed calico being sufficient to
buy a slave here, or twenty yards of the coarse stuff at threepence or
fourpence per yard in England.”

“What an
attempt at achieving a short-lived immortality! The woman died a pagan, but
her burial was one fit for a Christian. The text is a good one from which to
preach many a sermon here. Such prodigality in trying to procure a
short-lived immortality, with no care at all for the immortal soul.”

Among the
native artisans whom the king sent to help Mackay in this formidable
undertaking, was Walukaga, or Nua, the head blacksmith. A great friendship
sprang up between them, and Walukaga visited Mackay afterwards and listened
eagerly to all he was told of the Gospel, and cried out, "How is it when we
were making Namasole’s coffin, you told me none of these good things?”

Mr. Ashe
describes this man as “a splendid Christian, and one of the most intelligent
Africans he ever knew.” In the time of the deep trouble of the mission in
connection with the fate of Bishop Hannington, the Church Council frequently
met in Walukaga’s enclosure; and on one of these occasions Mr. Ashe baptised
the young Admiral Gabunga.

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